By Mike Miazga
Correspondent
While the Timothy Christian girls basketball team was a tad short-handed during the recently completed summer season, coach Michele Strube was quite pleased with what unfolded.
“We did really well,” she said. “We were missing four varsity players, including two starters who couldn’t make the summer. We were very happy for our younger players who came up. We’re also very happy for our seniors, who played well. Everybody stepped up this summer. The younger girls got great experience. By the third week of summer league we were playing better than the first. I told them to look how much better they were doing in only three weeks. We have a lot of nice athletes. There are no superstars. It’s a well-rounded team. When the fall comes around we are going to be fine.”
The Trojans went 5-6 overall at the Lisle summer league, matching their record there from a year ago.
From an individual standpoint, Strube was thrilled with the contributions sophomore-to-be Hannah Schuringa made. “Hannah Schuringa’s play this summer was a beautiful thing,” the coach said. “She will be fun to watch this season. She was so dominant the first few games that teams started watching her. She was shooting from the outside and getting in there and rebounding. She is adjusting. She was a young freshman last year and this summer she came in and played spectacularly.”
Strube noted the Trojans lost to IC Catholic Prep by 20 points during regular summer play and then beat the Knights by a point in the summer-league tournament.
Timothy finished sixth at Lisle during the regular portion of the schedule and ended up taking fourth place in the tournament.
“That’s not bad,” said Strube. “We lost our next two games in the tournament by one point and two points and those were to teams who beat us badly before. The girls got back into it and did well.”
Timothy had two weeks of camp as well. “It’s the most girls we’ve ever had in the high-school camp,” said Strube. “Our JV team is developing. They will be very young. We’ll have four sophomores with us on the varsity, including the two freshmen from last year. There will be a lot of freshmen on the JV. I love having the numbers we have. We have a lot of girls who want to play basketball.”
Strube said in addition to Schuringa’s play, Timothy also benefited from the contributions of Jordyn Strube and Lauren Gehrke. “Jordyn played point guard the whole summer and did a good job,” she said. “She stepped up her rebounding when we needed her. Lauren stepped up her scoring. She has a beautiful shot and did really well this summer.”
The Trojans played the majority of the summer without Sureya Alex and Abby Carstensen. “We were missing two point guards,” said Strube. “Sureya was able to play in the last three games at the end and helped us a ton with the other important stuff such as ball-handling.”
Sophomore Sarah Carstensen also gained more varsity experience this summer. “Sarah is a nice shooter and a good scorer,” said Strube, whose team also will benefit from the presence of senior Heidi Westra and sophomore Greta Hoogstra during this upcoming season. “She got a little taste of varsity basketball. She likes to shoot and her shot got better.”
Strube likes the direction the group is headed in. “I’m especially proud of our younger girls for stepping up,” she said. “It was fun to watch this group get b
